Alberto Vargas: Works from the Max Vargas Collection - Tapa dura

The legendary pin-up girls painted in the 1940s and 1950s by Alberto Vargas are fiercely fought over by collectors, with one Playboy pin-up bringing in an auction record of $71,700 at Christie's in 2003. The publishing rights to the artist's work have been tied up in litigation for the past ten years. Now, the family is finally able to release a generous new collection of Vargas paintings and drawings, many of which are little known or previously unpublished. The famous "Varga Girls" from Playboy are here, of course, but alongside these highly sought-after pictures are early unseen works from the 1920s, unpublished watercolours rendered for Esquire, the celebrated Legacy Nudes, and much more. The accompanying essay and captions are by Vargas biographer Reid Stewart Austin, whose knowledge of the artist's work is second to none.

Reid Stewart Austin is an expert on the work of Alberto Vargas. He wrote the bestselling biography of Vargas in 1978 in collaboration with the artist, and is also the author of Varga: The Esquire Years (1987), as well as several articles on the artist for Playboy and other national US magazines.